The Magus  (1968)

Theatrical Release Information:
The Magus

In Guy Green's deliriously disorienting adaptation of John Fowles's acclaimed second novel, Michael Caine plays Nicholas Urfe, an English schoolteacher evading serious romantic commitment with stewardess Anne (Godard muse Anna Karina). As a last resort, Urfe escapes the clutches of his paramour by accepting a professorship on the Greek island of Phraxos, and, upon arrival, promptly discovers that his predecessor committed suicide. Via a clue left behind in the room of the deceased, Urfe soon encounters Conchis (Anthony Quinn), an impresario/psychic/black magician/filmmaker who may have been responsible for the former professor's death, and who twists Urfe's mind and perceptions, while subtly leading the young man down the path to higher consciousness. Urfe also discovers the radiant Lily (Candice Bergen), a Diana-like figure (and possibly a literal goddess incarnation), with whom he becomes instantly smitten - and who just happens to be Conchis's lover. The Magus - like End of the Road, Women in Love, Slaughterhouse Five and other high-brow literary adaptations from the late '60s and early '70s - belongs to that small patch of mind-benders produced when Hollywood would try literally anything to appeal to the psychedelia-obsessed counterculture. It encountered devastating reviews upon release in December 1968, and evaded video release for years, but time has been somewhat kind to the picture. It reemerged on DVD (in the States and the UK) in late 2006/early 2007, and a 2007 Sight & Sound review reassesses it as "neither as bad as remembered nor as good as it had the potential to be. Though its tendencies to precious dialogue and pun-making symbolism. . . are a bit alienating, one is nevertheless grateful to be met by a film of some intelligence and pretension (not in a bad sense) to art, more interested in amplifying the viewer's mind with questions than in answering them." ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide